“I may be the first person in history to make fund-raising telephone calls from the slopes of Mt. Everest,” Musey joked as he discussed his motivation to turn his personal endeavor into a philanthropic one. “But unfortunately, the devastation caused by the Myanmar cyclone and the earthquake in China show once again how important relief organizations like the Red Cross are in the world.” To date, Musey has secured pledges to the Red Cross in excess of $40,000 from a number of satellite industry firms in support of his climb. These include contributions of $15,000 each from SES and Intelsat, the two largest satellite operators in the world. A number of other firms and individuals have pledged either cash contributions or donated satellite communications equipment or airtime to Musey’s effort.
Musey and his team of 9 climbers, 3 guides and about 30 Sherpa staff, plus a small herd of yaks packing their supplies, have spent the past several weeks trekking up and back from the lower reaches of Mt. Everest. They move further up the mountain each time from Base Camp to Camps 1, 2, and finally Camp 3, which sits at approximately 23,000 feet. This intense regimen is necessary even for the most experienced climbers to get their bodies used to increasingly less oxygen as they move to higher altitudes in scaling the mountain. The team recently descended to a town below Base Camp to recover. Now that they have completed the rigorous acclimatization process, they have begun their final attempt at the summit—Mt. Everest
